Good Morning

By Reverend Billy Talen · April 02, 2015

02

April 2015

It seems like a dream. Yesterday's BIZARRE COURT-ROOM SCENE. Our lawyers talked to the District Attorney's office all week, after they finally watched the videotape that shows me peacefully submitting to the arrest in Grand Central on January 6th. We learned yesterday while we waited in the hallway outside that the DA would drop all charges. Moments later we stood before the judge and the Assistant DA began to talk.

We couldn't believe our ears. We looked back at the impassive judge. The DA apparently felt that before setting me free they would have to recite the fanciful claims of the police, despite the fact that they are refuted by a clear and continuous videotape. So we listened to a list of about a dozen lies. "Defendant forced the officer's arms." and "Defendant refused to pick up the placards from the floor" and "His protest signs impeded right of way for commuters in the train station." All lies.

Then the DA had the gall to offer his pity. "But in the interests of justice your honor, People offers to dismiss these charges." Completely schizoid. Wylie Stecklow, our lawyers, hit the court-room roof, "We were not told that these false charges would be read in open court. I am deeply offended." But the sad reality that we were left with is that we still have a law enforcement culture that cannot accept the innocence of their political opponents, even a comic spiritual clown like myself. Reality itself is not enough to persuade them to reach out, for healing, to move on.

What does this mean? Do they still insist that there is no epidemic of deadly force against unarmed citizens of color? Do they still refuse what everyone knows? And will they put these lies into the record as a hedge against future activism from me, as some future DA can repeat these fictions to a judge or jury and inspire an idea that somehow I worked the system to win acquittal but in fact was, sort of, guilty of violence?

By walking this lonely path I found out some things for our work. It is a kind of full-body research, and the things revealed point to a long road ahead. I am grateful for all your notes of gratitude. Next on the agenda of the Church of Stop Shopping, we are preparing our call for a ban on the spraying of the Monsanto cancer-causing glyphosate in New York. Monsanto is like these cops. They don't mind the sensation of brazen falsehood.